Wednesday, February 17

One of the main tools in my mental health toolbox that I've used for over thirteen years now, is to take it day by day. One day everything is amazing and then another day nothing is good, so it makes life easier to handle if we break it down into smaller chunks of time. In the last few weeks during this third lockdown, I've begun focusing on the day and week I'm in. Anything more than that and I'm far too overwhelmed.

In the very early days soon after I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety, I would break a day down into smaller bite-sized chunks. At work, we have a daily planner where the management plan out where the staff are to be during the day, so, for example, making sure the till is covered, making sure the staff have a lunch break and specific staff focusing on customer service at peak times. This planner is broken up into hourly sections so that's how I would tend to section up my day. What am I down to this hour? If I wasn't down for anything specific; what can I do to pass this hour? What things can I do that need doing to fill the time up and help pass the tougher hours until I'm scheduled for a specific task?

This hourly plan is a bit harder for me to do while I'm on furlough and in lockdown, so instead of an hourly breakdown, I tend to do the length of a task breakdown. I also make sure I get up and move throughout the day, to make a brew, get some more water, a snack, pee, to stretch ... you get the idea. It's very easy to not get up off the sofa for a few hours during this lockdown. I know I keep mentioning it here and over on Instagram, but I've had conversations with friends who agree with me. Winter is making this third lockdown much tougher.

Tuesday afternoon, for example, I had a nap after writing part of this blog post because I was feeling like I needed to rest, even though I had nine hours of sleep the night before! That morning, I was working on preparing and scheduling this week's Instagram posts to go up and in-between each post I made sure to stretch and hydrate.

After a few tough weeks I'm grateful that I'm feeling more motivated and that I'm being more productive again. I've only been posting to Instagram three days a week this month on the days my page is getting the most views. This means that not only are there not as many posts to find or take photo's for and also text to come up with, but this mainly makes my week much easier and I'm not putting as much pressure on myself to post every day. It means that I can have an easier "work" week of doing Instagram and blog tasks so I can rest and chill when I need to.

I'm much better now at not feeling guilty if I wake up and I'm not up to do doing what I'd planned to do. Or, if through out the day I need to stop a task and either nap or do something else for a while or even the rest of the day. I started working on this last year during the first lockdown once my therapy started and I was dredging up trauma from my past so some days were just hard. One thing my therapist said to me at this time which I always remind myself of is;

In other words, what is the best thing I can do for myself, today or right now? When my therapist said this to me, I was having a hard time doing one of the day-to-day things I'd managed previously, I was putting off driving to do a food shop. My anxiety was so ramped up that I wasn't trusting myself to drive, even though the shop's not that far away because I was so distracted and in my head from reliving my past trauma.

Some days were better than others even though my anxiety was the worst it had been in a while. So I would wait for a day where I felt up to driving to do my food shop, as I would be able to pay better attention to the traffic around me while I was driving. This sentence from my therapist has been most useful over this last year, especially with living in and out of lockdowns alongside the numerous restrictions when we weren't in a lockdown.

So when you're having a low day, remember it's okay to have those.

On those days, look for ways you can make them easier to cope with. What nice things can you do for yourself? Who can you reach out to for help? Write out a to-do list. What tasks have to be done today? Start with an easy one and then either keep going, moving from one to the next or rest in between. Whatever you need, you'll know on the day what's best for you. Focus on one thing at a time. Don't try to do too much if you're not up to it. It's more than okay to leave some things for another day.